94: Toxic Friendships

“Our relationships will mimic and reflect the relationship we had with our primary caregivers unless and until we become aware of what we’re doing.”

Dr. Allison Quadhamer is living a fine life and she has some insight on how you might too.

Allison’s exploration of her own chaotic childhood led her to a master’s degree in communications (the basis of healthy relationships); a doctorate in chiropractic (the basis of healthy bodies); and advanced training in neurology (the basis of healthy minds).

Allison came to understand how our perceptions, influenced by any number of elements, color the way we see the world. Allison believes that by rethinking our distorted perceptions, we can experience clarity and attain a fine life.

Join us this week as Allison shares her perspectives on a “fine life;” the fallibility of memory; toxic friendships and relationships; and the power of chiropractic work as it relates to working through trauma.

Quotes:
4:30 “What I and most people strive for, is simply to be fine…When you think about it, you just want fine. You don’t want happy, you don’t want exuberant. All of that plays into it but ultimately the underpinning is to have that sense of stability or certainty that ‘I can handle whatever comes my way,’ which ultimately mean it’s fine. Kind of how I look at the world is like, if things are not fine, they’re not over. If you haven’t made your peace with it, you haven’t understood that you can handle this, that you can get through this, then it’s not fine yet which means it’s not over and there’s still work to do.”

8:00 “The good enough is an example of a mom who owns what she can and cannot do, owns her strengths, knows her weaknesses and looks at her kid like ‘This is how I come to the table, kid, I’m gonna do the best with what I got.’ And ultimately from that ground, with your child or with anyone really, you can create a relationship both recognizing your strengths and your weaknesses and create a harmonious relationship as opposed to a toxic or a codependent relationship.”

9:10 “It’s the recognition that the best is not perfect.”

11:43 “What most of us who are not addicted to substances, we can become addicted to drama or the chaos especially if you’re brought up in that kind of environment and we didn’t have role models to show us what healthy interaction looked like and so we find ourselves repeating these patterns of having a revolving door of friends right? And it’s the same scenario in different phases as we go through our lives, with very few people who hang on for the long haul.”

12:30 “The concept of cosigning negative behavior…It’s sort of this license to be self-destructive or act against your best interests for the sake of camaraderie. So these would be the people who are like ‘We’re going to have an enemy’…Or “we’re going to continue to gossip about all of these people behind their backs,’ and never do they ever turn to you and say ‘You know, there might be another way to handle that.’…Or encouraging you to perpetuate unhealthy coping mechanisms or behaviors you’ve developed…You’re also going to look at things where time, spaces and boundaries are not respected so it would be like the calling at 3 AM…and then letting that happen. You could also potentially look at friendships that supersede the other primary relationship.”

18: “This is a common dynamic not just in friendships but also in romantic relationships and family dynamics, where there are a lot of toxic elements and the person who feels victimized or feels subjugated also claims to feel powerless in the dynamic and they just have to go along with what’s being done or they have to accept that they are the victim. And the reality is that’s not true. You always have the choice to speak up or walk away. It’s just that the consequences of those choices are not always desirable because in that dynamic when we are the party who feels as though we are the victim, a lot of times we’re in the relationship for the sake of the relationship. It wouldn’t matter who was on the other end of that relationship, it’s just as long as someone is there…Because there is an underlying fear of being alone or a significant lack of self-worth and the fear that they won’t be able to do it on their own or that they’re kind of making friends with the devil they know.”

20:35 “The right person is you. You have to become the right person.”

21:45 “Our perception is what we think is our reality. Perception is reality and reality is perception it is highly influenced by the environment that we grew up in, it is highly influenced by the meal we had for lunch, how much we slept, whether or not we just exercised…because all of those things are going to affect what we can become consciously aware of in the moment…Our perceptions are wholly subject to things we have or currently are experiencing and none of it is real.”

25:39 “When it comes to perception, the perceptions that we have in terms of memory – memory is not remembering. It’s not like going into a file cabinet…We actually go back and are reliving, we physiologically are reliving the event as we have stored it in our memory…Because every time you run a memory, it creates new pathways and new wiring in your brain and you either strengthen or weaken it depending on how many times and how often you remember it and so every time it changes a little bit…Memory is fallible. Your memory is a lie…When it comes to perception and knowing that memory is fallible, memory changes on its own, it’s just based on how often you remember it and the state that you’re in when you remembering it, you can actually work with your memory to change your perception.”

29:30 “Our relationships will mimic and reflect the relationship we had with our primary caregivers unless and until we become aware of what we’re doing.”

30:15 – “Your friends, especially if you still have your parents and romantic relationships in your life, are not the primary source that you’re looking for for love and approval but the friends, in that dynamic if you’re still in that place of repeating cycles, are going to help you victimize yourself, they’re going to help you create enemies out of your romantic partners and/or your parents, they’re going to manipulate you into repeating the cycle of drama and lack of self-worth and lack of self-love because there’s still an element in them who need someone is broken.”